Radio Free Alice apologise to “Black artists” over back-fired comment on Usher song
Australian post-punk band Radio Free Alice have issued an apology after receiving backlash for deeming an Usher song “the ugliest duckling of bad songs”.
When appearing on the popular Triple J series, Like A Version, the band criticised Usher’s 2010 hit ‘DJ Got Us Fallin’ in Love’ before injecting it with grizzly guitars and a furious drum-beat.
“We’ve always felt that good songs don’t need good covers,” frontman Noah Learmonth said. “It’s like, bad songs that need good covers. This song is like the ugliest duckling of bad songs, I think. So we thought it was a fun challenge to see if we could turn it into a swan. If that was physically possible.”
Quickly, the band amassed a large quantity of criticism for the statement. Comments were disabled on the original Instagram post of the cover, which was eventually removed from social media.
In an Instagram Story posted on April 17th, Learmonth issued an official apology for his comment.
“We’ve taken some time to sit with the response to our Like a Version interview, and we want to address it personally,” he began.
The frontman added, “We’ve done a lot of reflecting and it’s clear we didn’t consider the hurt our words about Usher’s song could have caused to Black artists and other communities, and for that we are sorry.”
He clarified that it was never the band’s intention to offend anyone: “Our intention was for it to be tongue in cheek, which isn’t an excuse for misjudging how it would land, particularly as a band of four white Australian males (I grew up in the UK – hence the accent).
The apology continued, “We now better understand the issues many of you have raised, and we will continue to learn from them.”
The statement concluded, “We care a lot about the music we make and the community around it, and we don’t take your criticism lightly. Hope to see you out there soon.”
The band is gearing up to release their first full-length album, which is allegedly due sometime in 2026.
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